Ring-drop assembly and latch means therefor



May 21, 1968 RING-DROP ASSEMBLY AND LATCH MEANS THEREFOR 5 Sheets-Sheet 1 Filed Aug. 18, 1966 evyi A. 9

I MM R y 21, 1968 B. A. 80665 3,383,848

RING-DROP ASSEMBLY AND LATCH MEANS THEREFOR Filed Aug. 18, 1966 3 Sheets-Sheet 2 [III Ill/Ill F INVENTOR Beryi A. Boggs BY Signp, 5. RM CL. Hm

ATTORNEY May 21, 1968 B. A. BOGGS RING-DROP ASSEMBLY AND LATCH MEANS THEREFOR Filed Aug. 18, 1966 3 Sheets-Sheet L5 INVENTOR Beryl A. Boggs United States Patent 3,383,848 RING-BRQP ASSEMBLY AND LATCH MEANS THEREFOR Beryl A. Boggs, Chesterfield County, Va., assignor to Allied Chemical Corporation, New York, N.Y., a corporation of New York Filed Aug. 18, 1966, Ser. No. 573,324 Claims. (Cl. 57-54) This invention relates to novel ring-drop assemblies and latch means therefor, for use in spinning and winding machines having traveler rings mounted on ring rails for reciprocating the rings through their traverse strokes relative to the spindles to which the thread or yarn is guided.

The drop assembly is provided with a horizontal latching edge extending to both sides of a guide rod for latching over the shoulders of a latch pivotally hung at the bottom of the traverse ring support slidably mounted on said guide rod and having double edges extending downwardly from said shoulders. The latch is biased towards the latching position so that the drop assembly may be pulled up until the horizontal edge is sprung over said shoulders to the normally latched position on said traverse ring support at whatever level it might be on said guide rod.

Thus, in order to drop the ring for dofling, etc., the pivoted latch is pulled back to unlatched position by a lever mounted on the drop assembly by means of a pull wire passed around the outside of a ring to a fingeroperated lever at the front of the ring holder Where a handle may be provided for gripping the ring to raise or lower same when desired. When the ring holder is dropped, it clears the way for the removal of a full bobbin and replacing it with an empty one.

There are many ring drop assemblies in the prior art with various types of latch means. These, however, are cumbersome, difficult to operate, and impossible to design for high-speed work in restricted space-environment for large packages.

In comparison to this invention, the prior art discloses the extension of the traverse stroke of the ring rail downwardly below its normal Winding traverse to feed the end of the yarn to the waist collar, and at the same time to clear the bottom of the full bobbin for easy dofiing. Thus, all of the rings on the rail are lowered simultaneously for dofiing and donning all of the bobbins at the same time. This requires long periods of stoppage for servicing the entire bank of spindles. In comparison, the present invention is designed so that only one bobbin may be stopped at a time thus, keeping the idle time for all of the bobbins at a minimum.

While there are other drop assemblies in the art which provide means for releasing the individual ring supports, one at a time, from the ring rail or other reciprocating traverse means so that they may be lowered below the bobbin, these assemblies are not designed to be used with large rings needed to prepare the larger packages. In comparison, the twisting rings of this invention are secured to a tube system which slidably embraces one or more rods extending vertically downward from a traversing beam in a direction parallel to the spindle axis. The tube system normally is detachably secured to the rods by a quick-release locking mechanism. In the latched position the tube system, the twisting rings and the traverse means reciprocate with the rods as in normal package building, but while in the released position the tube system slides freely on the reciprocating rods and thereby may be maintained below the bobbin to facilitate dofling and donning.

More specifically, the instant drop assembly comprises a substantially rectangular tube system which slidably embraces a substantially rectanguar rod extending vertical- 3,383,848 Patented May 21, 1968 1y downward from the support guide which is mounted on the traversing beam. The ring holder is mounted directly on the ring-holder support or tube system. The mounting surface at the top of the ring holder is substantially close to the outside of the ring itself so that there is minimum clearance between the ring and the support guides. This design allows maximum ring sizes to be used within the smallest spacing-between the spindle axis and the tube system. The latching means in the drop assembly extends to both sides of the tube system as well as around the back thereof and, therefore, does not require any space in front of the tube system between the ring and the support guide as does the prior art. In addition, other novel features include a hand grip with a trigger for the latch means and a trip wire connected to the latch release lever. The rectangular tube for slidably gliding the assembly over the rectangular drop rod facilitates the ease of raising and lowering the assembly on the rod. The rectangular rod is rounded off on the short sides of the rectangle so that there is actually a line contact on the front and rear of the inside surfaces of the short sides of the rectangular section of the tube against the rod. This reduces the sliding friction even under substantially large bearing support pressures while at the same time provide a firm guide bearing with the fiat side surfaces having minimum bearing pressures on the inside surfaces of the long sides of the rectangular section of the tube to hold the parts in firm alignment. The ring holder may be prepared from a light metal such as aluminum and the overall simplicity of the assembly makes it very light in structure and easy to operate.

Accordingly, it is an object of this invention to provide a light, efficient and compact design of ring-drop assembly and latch means therefor adapted to accommodate the use of the largest ring-size for any restricted spacing'requirements between the axis of the ring and its dropassembly guide rod suspended under the ring rail in a multi-spindle machine environment.

Another object is to provide a simple reliable latch means between the guide-rod supports on the ring rail and the ring support bearings slidably mounted on said guide rod.

Another object is to provide the ring of this ring drop assembly with a small handle at the front thereof to facilitate the raising or lowering of the ring and guide bearing assembly when it is unlatched from its ring rail suspension bracket.

A further object is to incorporate a latch release trigger in said handle adapted to operate a spring pressed release lever through a pull wire extending from the latch means around the ring to said trigger.

A still further object is to provide a hard-spring wedging action for taking-up the guide support bearing clearance on the guide rod in the fore and aft direction as well as 'angularly about its axis, when the drop assembly is latched to the ring rail suspension bracket.

These and other specific objects of the invention will become apparent from a further and more detailed description of the novel ring-drop assembly as illustrated in the accompanying drawings, wherein:

FIG. 1 is a plan view of the ring drop assembly partly in section, showing the pull wire connection between the latch release lever and the finger trigger in the ring handle;

'FIG. 2 is a side elevation thereof;

FIG. 3 is a rear elevation thereof;

FIGS. 4, 5, 6 and 7 are enlarged detail sectional views taken on the lines 44, 5-5, 6-6, and 7--7 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 8 is a perspective view showing the ring drop assembly in latched normally operating position for reciprocation with the ring rail;

FIG. 9 is a similar perspective view of the assembly in released position of the ring-support bearing dropped down on the guide rod for lowering it below the range of the traverse of the ring rail suspension bracket when desired and FIG. 10 is a side view of the assembly, partly in section showing its relation to the spindle at the bottom of the range of traverse of the assembly, below which it may be dropped when the latch is released.

More specifically, as shown in FIGS. l-9, the novel ring-drop assembly is adapted for mounting on a conventional ring rail 10 by means of a suspension bracket block 12 which may be fixed to the ring rail by means of bolts or screws (not shown) passed through the bolt holes 14. The suspension bracket block may be cast of a suitable metal, e.g. aluminum alloy and machined to provide an axially extending slot centrally in its front face, in which the upper end of the guide rod 16 is fixed, and to provide a pair of narrower slots 18, one on each side of the central slot, extending into the lower front corner of the block. A pin 29 passed laterally through these slots and the guide rod 16, fixes the rod to the block and provides bearings for the arms 22 of a latch lever pivotally hung thereon.

The latch lever has a portion 24 extending between the rear edges of the arms 22 back of the guide rod and a pair of wings 26 extending laterally from the front edges of the lower portions of the arms to form cam surfaces 28 for swinging the latch lever rearwardly against the bias of a coil spring 30 which is mounted between a projection 32 on the portion 24 and a pocket 34 in the bottom of block 12.

The ring support bearing assembly comprises a tubular guide bearing 36, freely and slidably mounted on the guide rod 16 which is substantially rectangular in cross section and has a channel bracket plate fixed to the upper end of the tubular guide bearing. The one side 38 of the channel, forms the bottom of the bracket, and is wider than the depth of the guide bearing 36. The channel is slotted from the bottom through its sides to a distance equal to the depth of the guide bearing, the upper end of which is fixed in said slot so that the front of the guide bearing is flushed with the front of the channel bracket. The upper side of the channel is somewhat narrower than the bottom of the bracket and has its outer edge 40 turned downwardly about midway of the depth of the tubular guide bearing to form a suspension edge 42 on each side of the bearing. This is for latching over the upper edges 44 of the wings 26 of the latch lever when the ring-guide bearing assembly is raised, so as to engage the cam surfaces 28 of the wings 26 by the outer edges 40 to swing the latch lever against its spring bias until the suspension edge 42 is raised over the upper edges of the wings 26 to latch the assembly in place.

The latch lever may be swung to its unlatching position as shown in dotted lines in FIG. 6 by operating the cam lever 46 against its bias spring 48. This engages the cam surface 28 on one of the arms 22 of the latch lever, so as to swing the latch supporting edges 44 from under the supported edges 42, releasing the ring-support assembly from its latched position so that it may be lowered independently of the ring rail below its traverse range for doffing or other purposes, without interrupting the regular traverse operations of the other traveler rings connected to the ring rail.

Cam lever 46 is actuated by a pull wire 50 which is extended around the ring holder 52 to the finger trigger 54 positioned in the handle 56 at the front of the ring holder. Thus, the operator can easily lower the ring support assembly after pressing the trigger with a finger of the gripping hand to release the assembly from the traversing ring rail suspension bracket.

The ring holder is a light hollow casting, the upper surface plate of which has a downwardly extending rear flange portion 58 with mounting bolt holes 60, spaced to each side of the axis of the holder 52 so as to accommodate a maximum size ring 62 for the space available between the spindle or ring axis 64 and the front of the tubular guide bearing 36 which is flush with the ring support surface 66 on the front of the bottom 39 of the channel which forms the bracket plate.

A pair of slidably adjustable heavy spring wedging lugs 68 is mounted in the side corner grooves 70 in the bottom of the guide-rod support bracket block 12 for engagement with slotted openings '72 in the upper side of the channel of the ring support bracket, as the ring sup port assembly is raised into latching position. This firmly stabilizes the ring mounting relative to the traversing means by taking up any clearances between the tubular guide bearing and the guide rod in the fore and aft direction as well as angularly about the axis of the guide rod.

FIG. 10 shows the ring-drop assembly in its relation to the spindle 74 on which a bobbin is shown in broken lines 76 with its lower flange at 78. A spindle separator plate is shown at 80, the upper edge of a balloon plate is seen at 82. Other parts including the ring rail support may be seen at 8 on which the ring rail 11"; is mounted, the lower guide bearing at 86, one of the bracket for the ring-rail lever shaft 9%) at 88, one of the ring-rail levers at 92, and a spindle drive pulley at 94.

The ring rail is at the bottom of its traverse as shown in FIG. 10, and the ring drop assembly in its latched position, is therefore at the bottom of its range of traverse, but may be released to drop it below said range when desired by unlatching it from the ring-rail assembly.

Many obvious modifications may be made in the arrangement and details of the several parts of these assemblies without departing from the spirit and the scope of the present invention as defined in the appended claims.

What is claimed is:

1. A ring-drop assembly for yarn winding machines and the like having a traversing ring rail, comprising a guide-rod supporting bracket block adapted for mounting on said ring rail and having a guide rod extending downwardly under said ring rail,

a tubular guide bearing slidably mounted on said guide rod and having a ring-support bracket at the top,

said ring-support bracket having a ring-supporting face plate substantially flush with the front of said tubular guide bearing and extending to both sides thereof, and

latch means between said guide-rod support bracket block and said ring-support bracket,

said latch means having axially overlapping members with releasably interlocked supported and supporting edges in the normally latched position of said latch means,

said overlapping members and their interlocked edges extending laterally to both sides of said guide bearing.

2. A ring drop assembly as defined in claim 1 with said overlapping members comprising a portion of the ring-support bracket on the guide bearing formed to provide said supported edges, and a latch lever straddling said guide rod with a pair of arms pivotally hung on the sides thereof formed to provide said supporting edges in front of said arms;

said latch lever being normally biased into its latched position, and

a spring-pressed cam lever mounted on said ring support bracket for swinging said latch lever to disengage said interlocked edges to release said ring support bracket and guide bearing assembly, whereby it may be lowered below its normal traverse range without interrupting the continued normal traverse operation of other rings mounted on the ring rail.

3. A ring drop assembly as defined in claim 2 and a ring holder having a downwardly extending rear flange mounted on said ring supporting face plate by bolts spaced from the axis of said ring holder to ac- With a hanger edge extending laterally to each side of said guide bearing adapted for hooking over the top edges of the wings extending from the front edges of the side arms of said latch lever.

7. A ring-drop assembly as defined in claim 6, and

a spring-pressed cam lever mounted on said ring support bracket for swinging said latch lever to disengage said interlocked edges to release said ring-support bracket and guide bearing assembly, whereby it may be lowered below its normal traverse range commodate a maximum size ring from the spacing 5 without interrupting the continued normal traverse available as determined by the distance between the operation of other rings mounted on said ring rail. axes .of the ring and the guide rod. 8. A ring drop assembly as defined in claim 7, and

4. A ring drop assembly as defined in claim 3, .a ring holder having a downwardly extending rear with said ring holder having a handle extending from flange mounted on said ring-support face plate by the front to facilitate moving the ring and guide bolts spaced from the axis of said ring holder to bearing assembly on said guide rod into and out of accommodate the maximum size ring for the spacing latching engagement with the guide-rod support available as determined by the distance between the bracket block. axis of the ring and the guide rod.

5. A ring drop assembly as defined in claim 4 and 9. A ring-drop assembly as defined in claim 8,

a finger trigger mounted in said handle having a pull said ring holder having a handle extending from the wire connection to said cam lever for releasing said front to facilitate moving the ring and guide bearing latch lever. assembly on said guide rod into and out of latching 6. A ring drop assembly for spinning and winding maengagement with the guide rod suspension bracket chines having a ring rail for reciprocating traveler rings block. mounted thereon, through their traverse strokes, compis- 10. A ring rail assembly as defined in claim 9, and ing a finger trigger mounted in said handle having a pull a ring-rail suspension bracket block adapted for mountwire connection to said cam lever, for releasing said ing on said ring rail and a guide rod extending downlatch lever. wardly therefrom under said ring rail,

a spring-pressed latch lever with side arms having a References Cited portion extending between the rear edges thereof UNITED STATES PATENTS back of said guide rod and wings extending laterally out-wardly from the lower portions of the front edges 1r495'636 5/1924 Fcaster 57 124 of said side arms to form a cam surface for said 1,789,170 1/1931 COX 57122 latch lever and latch-supporting upper edges at the 3,044,249 7/1952 Ancaram 57-122 p of said Wings, and FOREIGN PATENTS a tubular-guide bearing slidably mounted on said guide a rod having a ring-support bracket at its upper end g igi FRANK J. COHEN, Primary Examiner.

DONALD E. WATKINS, Examiner.

Disclaimer 3,383,848.-Beryl A. Boggs, Chesterfield County, Va. RING-DROP ASSEM- BLY AND LATCH MEANS THEREFOR. Pa-tent dated May 21,

1968. Disclaimer filed April 28, 1969, by the assignee, Allied Chemical Corporation.

Hereby enters this disclaimer to claims 1 and 6-10, inclusive, of said patent.

[Ofiicial Gazette June 3, 1.969.] 

1. A RING-DROP ASSEMBLY FOR YARN WINDING MACHINES AND THE LIKE HAVING A TRAVERSING RING RAIL, COMPRISING A GUIDE-ROD SUPPORTING BRACKET BLOCK ADAPTED FOR MOUNTING ON SAID RING RAIL AND HAVING A GUIDE ROD EXTENDING DOWNWARDLY UNDER SAID RING RAIL, A TUBULAR GUIDE BEARING SLIDABLY MOUNTED ON SAID GUIDE ROD AND HAVING A RING-SUPPORT BRACKET AT THE TOP, SAID RING-SUPPORT BRACKET HAVING A RING-SUPPORTING FACE PLATE SUBSTANTIALLY FLUSH WITH THE FRONT OF SAID TUBULAR GUIDE BEARING AND EXTENDING TO BOTH SIDES THEREOF, AND 